Bilal Ahmed is a writer and activist. He is currently preparing for his dissertation, which will compare tribal structures, and state relations, in Pakistan and Yemen.

Last week, Moroccan asylum seeker Abderrahman Mechkah appeared in court on video from his hospital bed, where he was recovering after being shot in the leg by Finnish police. Mechkah pled guilty to stabbing two women to death in the coastal city of Turku, but argued that his rampage was not terrorism. (More…)

In 2004, King Abdullah of Jordan warned that a “Shia Crescent” of Iranian-led movements and governments would begin to dominate the northern Middle East. His predictions were quickly echoed by regional leaders, from Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak to defensive Persian Gulf monarchs, and an American security establishment overly focused on Tehran’s influence in a number of regional capitals. (More…)

It’s highly unlikely that President Trump will adopt Erik Prince’s proposal to privatise the war in Afghanistan. Prince’s plan, first published as on op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in May, triggered a heated discussion that remains ongoing. The piece was especially provocative coming from the nominally reserved WSJ. (More…)

Throughout the refugee crisis, European news media has focused on Syrians, often at the expense of other significant groups of migrants. Among these are Afghans seeking asylum in the EU, who made up 15% of total applicants in 2016. Afghans were also the second largest refugee group by nationality and were the biggest before the Syrian Civil War. (More…)

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been savage in his criticisms of the EU. “The European Union’s court, the European Court of Justice, my esteemed brothers,” Erdoğan exclaimed after an ECJ ruling in March allowing employers to ban the headscarf, “have started a Crusade against the Crescent.” (More…)

It’s clear from the #BoycottNovara controversy that “callouts,” which have become popular in feminist and anarchist circles, need to be reexamined. Increasingly, callout culture has become synonymous with social media mobbing, boycotts, abusive e-mails, and shunning, now being aimed at Novara Media editors. (More…)

On April 30, German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere published an extremely controversial article in Bild in which he outlined ten features of a German Leitkultur (“leading culture”), including “enlightened patriotism,” shaking people’s hands, reading Goethe, supporting Israel, and “no Burka.” (More…)

On April 7, Rakhmat Akilov was arrested while covered in blood and glass in Marsta, a suburb north of Stockholm. Four days later, Rakhmat admitted to stealing a Spendrups beer truck and driving it into the Ahlens department store in Drottninggattan, killing four people and injuring fifteen others. (More…)

It is increasingly clear that the United States will not be seeking “regime change” in Syria, which has been foreseeable since President Trump ordered missile strikes two weeks ago. American news media has largely accepted the claim that Trump acted out of emotional impulse, to worldwide acclaim. (More…)

President Trump continues to face paranoid accusations that he was elected with the direct assistance of the Kremlin. As a result of the Cold War theatrics, Trump’s most realistic objectives in U.S.-Russia relations, as well as his broader international outlook, have not been properly discussed. (More…)

The White House has attracted fresh controversy for a botched raid in Yemen that led to the death of a Navy SEAL, loss of a $75 million aircraft, and dozens of civilian casualties. Trump has been characterised as reckless, and freshly unfit for duty. (More…)

Lale Colak died upon release from Kartal Prison, Istanbul, on December 20, 2000. She couldn’t speak, her mouth was ulcerated, and her hair had turned white after 222 days without solid food. Lale’s mother says that she didn’t want to die, but was militantly devoted to a wave of prisoner hunger strikes that took aim at the expansion of Turkish mass incarceration. (More…)